powdery mildew problem

Alright, so I first got the powdery mildew problem about 2 weeks ago. It was originally very slight. It looked like a little dust on the leaves. It wasn't as bad as ANY of the pictures I've seen on here of it

we followed forums and ended up spraying it with vinegar water every 3 days. That worked, but the mold would slightly come back every 3 days.. Not hardly as bad as it was before

then we flushed and used serenade 2 weeks before harvest. The 6th day after using serenade I see a very, very slight powdery mildew on the leaves. It looks a little white under the hps light. Using a 100x microscope, I can only see 6-10 very sparse spores on the leaves I cut off because they were the worse.

I only have about 8 days until I harvest. I'm debating about what I should do. My gf things we should spray alkaline water on it. I'm thinking we should a) do nothing or b) spray more serenade on it and then make hash out of the plants, then running the hash through the screens again with pure water thus washing it.

I have 4 grand daddy purples. Here are pics:

Before we had any mold:


After we sprayed with serenade (note the crystals are because of the 600watt hps + 100 watt mecury vapor uvb lamp. There is no visable mold in these pictures)

bump for sadness

you sure its mold? it could be from foliar feeding with things other than water. then the lights dry up the water leaving residue behind from teh chemicals mixed with the water.

get a dehumidifier running in there

You can tell the difference between nutrients and powdery mildew. Also, foliar feeding in an under-ventilated environment too late in the light cycle will increase PM production. If you MUST foliar feed, do it immediately after the lights come on, but at the same time- doing that won't resolve the problem. Once powdery mildew exists on a plant, it's IN the plant and there isn't much you can do to fight it. Serenade will prevent it from growing on the surface of the plant, and will also help kill it.

Just make sure that a day or two before harvest you give em a good serenade, and make sure everything dries out prior to the lights going out. Then when you harvest make sure better ventilation is provided and make sure the lights stay off for the entire period to prevent any unexpected spots from showing up while the plant is finished drying out.

For future reference - Serenade is best used prior to the flowering stage, and it is important that you maintain excellent ventilation.

Will serenade affect the taste of the bud after you harvest if you use it 2 days before?

GrowTech said:

You can tell the difference between nutrients and powdery mildew. Also, foliar feeding in an under-ventilated environment too late in the light cycle will increase PM production. If you MUST foliar feed, do it immediately after the lights come on, but at the same time- doing that won't resolve the problem. Once powdery mildew exists on a plant, it's IN the plant and there isn't much you can do to fight it. Serenade will prevent it from growing on the surface of the plant, and will also help kill it.

Just make sure that a day or two before harvest you give em a good serenade, and make sure everything dries out prior to the lights going out. Then when you harvest make sure better ventilation is provided and make sure the lights stay off for the entire period to prevent any unexpected spots from showing up while the plant is finished drying out.

For future reference - Serenade is best used prior to the flowering stage, and it is important that you maintain excellent ventilation.

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for next time, sulphur burners are a good preventative measure. for this time, i guess the spores wil get through the screen into the hash? true story - my mate told me about some amazing weed he had, i think he described it as a some sort of blueberry type colour (sic). i smoked some and it got me high. then he showed me it and it was no amazing weed - it was covered in powdery mildew! his dealer is one motherfucker. i wouldnt recommene smoking it though, when the spores burn you're inhaling it, maybe the bad shit gets burned up, maybe it doesnt, who knows??

I've been thinking about it and I have some questions that came up:
1) do you have to visually seed the mold on the buds for it to be dangerous to smoke? I have yet to see any mold on buds, but only slight mold on the fan leaves
2) will the bubble bag screens filter out the mold spores? I'd like to make hash out of the plant rather than tossing it
3) Will serenade make the bud safe to smoke ever with non-visible mold spores?
4) Will serenade if used 1-2 days before harvest affect the taste of 1) the hash 2) the bud?

Unfortunately, I don't think I can use a sulfur burner because it's not safe for people/pets, and this is a closet grow

I hashed it. looking under the scope there is no powdery mildew spores in the hash. I think it all got separated through the filters. I use the 8 bag set. One plant yielded about 8 grams the first time through.

I would have listened to your girl! I used 1T baking soda, 1T Hemp-peppermint soap, 1T Hemp seed oil (a hemp version of the Cornell formula which uses Horticultural oil) to a gallon of water and sprayed...nothing I would mind smoking and it is very effective, and can be used up to harvest day.

But if it was in the buds, hash was a good call.

when I turned the light back on, it was on the lower buds. I didn't see any on the top buds at all, but hash worked out well. I only yielded about 14 grams dry of the highest 2 grades. The low grades I'm using for hash butter.

Serenade is supposed to be really good when you activate it. My gf just sprayed it on w/o activating it because she didn't want to spray molasses on the buds for whatever reason. The way you activate it is, you mix serenade w/ black strap molasses and let it sit for a couple days. The bacteria grows and eats all the molasses, and it's much more effective from what I've read. I'm growing sour diesel and cheese now, and I have no signs of mold what so ever. I also upgraded to a larger 25sqft tent.

Next time I grow the GDP, I'm definitely not going to top them. They're really bushy as it is. Topping just made them insane. Each plant would have taken up about 9sqft if I had the space.